The Helen Schlegel in me is still alive...

much to my relief.

The heat was unbearable, the humidity terrible,
The curtains inadequate shields for the sun...
How was I to while away, this sultry, resinous April day?
Was there a way, if only one, To bear the burthen of this sun?

I picked up a book I never thought I would...
The front and back covers didn't seem too good.
'Not literary enough,' said my fine 'sensibility,'
This tome is trash, an unwanted liability...
But I felt brave, and flipped it open,
Romance I'd craved all morn you see...
And it did seem to me
That this book would be soppy enough to please me
Mushy enough to annoy and tease me
And apart from the irrate comment or two, (or maybe 3)
It did mostly woo...
my mind. A most troubling yet gratifying find.
It did too help, that I
Imagined, *here I sigh*
**r*** **h**'s form in the protagonist's role,
Down to the very last mole...
And I fished out romance from the most unsavoury parts,
and skilfully escaped the author's chosen darts...
He couldn't pin me down to his biases or opinions,
My imagination flew off on a pair of forged pinions...
What am I writing, oh for the sake of rhyming,
My mind is whining, I should be dining...
SOOOONEER